The use of inserts for separating articles in a case is well-known, of course. Such inserts are generally used to separate fragile articles such as bottles so as to reduce the danger of breakage during storage or transit. Such inserts often take the form of a criss-cross of sheets of packaging material, the criss-cross defining compartments within which the articles are individually contained.
Generally, however, the case itself constitutes the loadbearing member of such a package, i.e. the member which would, for example, carry the weight of a stack of cases loaded on top of the package, and the separators are not required to bear any load.
With the advent of large shops and supermarkets, the problem of more effective, yet inexpensive, presentation of goods to prospective purchasers has arisen, and this has encouraged the development of packages which can also serve as components of display stands. In particular, the use of shrink-wrap packs having only wrapping material for vertical sides, has now become popular, and since the outer envelope of shrink-wrap packs is inadequate for resisting compressive forces acting on the pack, additional structural support is necessary.
Packaging inserts designed to act as load-bearing members are already known in principle. Thus, British patent specification No. 1,103,798 describes a one-piece packaging insert suitable for use in a shrink-wrap pack, which combines the two functions of separating articles and protecting them from compressive forces. However, there is an overriding factor in the choice of such an insert, i.e. that it should be simple and cheap, whereas known packaging support members are comparatively complex. Accordingly an object of the present invention is the provision of a simple inexpensive load bearing insert member for use in a shrink wrapped package.
A further object of the present invention is the provision of a load bearing insert member that will provide a suitable stable platform for stacking further packages thereon.
A still further object of the invention is the provision of a load bearing insert member that, in position, will not completely shield from view any article at the periphery of the layer(s) in the package. These and other objects are accomplished by the invention hereinafter set forth.